An Echo of What Was
by xliterati
Summary: He was guilty, she was tired. Nothing more, nothing less.


_You only know what I want you to  
>I know everything you don't want me to<em>

* * *

><p><em>But somehow she's always the one who gets hurt.<em>

_I always end up getting hurt._

The cold air bit through Bonnie's clothes and frankly it could not have concerned her less. She was so tired, as if every bit of life in her had been drained. She had cried out the pain, the anger and the frustration, on the edge of her bed with her mother's lifeless body atop it. She had crawled into herself, with Caroline's strong arms around her to hold her. _To protect her. _

Bonnie had not asked for this. Not any of it. She had not asked to be a witch, she had not asked to protect her town, she had not asked to be thrown into the thousandth scheme the Salvatores were cooking, she had not asked for any of it. Yet here she was, sitting alone in her backyard dealing with the repercussions of the night.

Her mother was inside, transitioning and Caroline, wonderful as ever was helping her through it. Bonnie could not handle it, the darkening of her mother's eyes, the way her skin had turned pale and cold to the touch, the way her eyes had been begging for Bonnie to kill her. So Caroline, not once interjecting, had let Bonnie run out of the house. Bonnie who had lost so much, Bonnie who was afraid all the time, Bonnie who was just so _tired_.

_Please just make it go away, take it all away, _Bonnie silently pleaded.

Where Bonnie sat the grass had grown warm and the chill did not bite her anymore. She untangled her legs and laid them out in front of her, then slowly descended onto the grass, her entire body lying in the cold comfort of the lawn. Bonnie took a sharp breath, with the cold tips of the blades of grass tickling her neck, and sliding through the thin fabric of her sweater and poking her back. There was comfort in the cold, it was biting and relentless, and it was reassurance that she could still feel.

That after everything she had fought for and had lost, that Bonnie could still _feel_.

"Miss Bennett," a grave, heavy voice called out for Bonnie.

She closed her eyes briefly, breathing in the night air and the smell of the cold grass, before slowly getting up. Bonnie turned to the source of the voice, behind her, and shook her head with energy she could not afford. She half scoffed and half rolled her eyes as she saw the man who had addressed her. Elijah Michaelson.

"Is your family safe? All of them still alive I assume?" Bonnie attempted to fight, but her voice came out as nothing but an old woman's scorn.

Elijah breathed in slowly, steadily, everything about him was so calculated that it gave Bonnie the sudden urge to slap him.

"I am sorry Miss Bennett," Elijah's voice almost as tired as Bonnie's, hung in the stretched silence between them.

Bonnie narrowed her voice and with a slight raise of her arm brushed him off, "I don't want your apology, I don't need it. What I wanted, what I needed, was for your entire family to die tonight. So all of this," arms stretched out Bonnie gestured around her, "could have ended. And the least bit of normalcy we did have before you Originals showed up, could have been returned to this town."

She was still fighting, after everything that had happened tonight, Bonnie Bennett was still fighting.

"You view us as nothing but monsters don't you Miss Bennett?" Elijah asked softly.

Maybe it was the way he questioned her, the way his eyes were pleading for an answer, a reassurance that moral Elijah was in fact not a monster, that made Bonnie step forward.

Yet her answer was simple, no complicated reasoning and no reassurance, "Yes."

His eyes fell then, of shame, of regret and of honest, genuine guilt.

"Our mother feels the same, servant of Nature that she is. She wanted us dead because we are monsters, and I-," he stopped suddenly, then continued in a small whisper, "believe her."

Bonnie sighed heavily, there was a fury of irritation and pain, but as she looked at Elijah there was also a never ending sadness.

"I had not asked for this life Miss Bennett. I wanted to graze my lands on horses, I wanted to marry the most beautiful girl in our village and I had wanted a family. All I am now is the monster my mother wants to kill, and a man whose family is broken beyond repair. I have come not to seek forgiveness. I'm not quite certain why I'm here," Elijah spoke softly, and every word clung to Bonnie.

"_You_ hadn't asked for this?" Bonnie yelled in disbelief.

The abrupt anger in her voice startled Elijah and he met her fiery gaze.

"What about me? I'm supposed to be the Bennett witch! The saviour of this stupid town and everyone in it. I have given everything I have and I've lost it all, to save the lives of my friends and their families. To save the lives of Stefan and Damon, who turn around and kill my mother! And why? Because _YOU _could not allow for your mother to kill you? It had to be Elena, the girl we all love, or my mother. You are unbelievable. Get out of my house and leave me alone!"

Elijah flinched from the unadulterated fury that Bonnie lashed his way. She was in pain, from having lost everything, from being stuck in a life she had never asked for.

_Exactly like me. _

"Wait, you want to do something for me? Something that would guarantee my forgiveness? Bring me back everything I've lost because of you and your family. Bring me back my grandmother, make my mother human, and leave this goddamn town. If you do it, my forgiveness is yours for the taking," Bonnie spat out.

"But here's the thing. You can't do any of those things. You're not capable of it, no one is. Finn, Esther and Kol have already gone. Klaus will probably stay with your sister. And you? You look like you're leaving as well. Has your morality given way Elijah? Too guilty to meet the eyes of the town you and your family have destroyed?" Bonnie's anger was now edging on contempt and mockery.

"If you haven't listened to a word I have said to you, then at the very least remember this. The moral ones lose everything," Bonnie said, in a voice so stoic it would've killed any of her friends to hear.

She stared at him for a moment longer before turning around and staring out into the harsh forest before. A slight breeze picked her hair up slightly, had it dance around her shoulders and Elijah could smell the trace of her scent in the breeze. It carried her scent around him, enveloping him in its sweet vanilla scent. He closed his eyes, enveloping himself in the small brief joy. She reminded him of summer days in Mystic Falls, when his family used to run to the bazaar for treats. She reminded him of days he would love to see the sunset on the bulk of his favourite tree.

He had been wrong this entire time. Elijah had attributed all the humanity and all the compassion to the lovely Elena, who he had regarded with the utmost affection. No, it was not Elena that reminded him of what was best in being human. It was the mesmerizing witch before him. She stood feet away from him, silent and unyielding, her scent swaying in the breeze that drifted to Elijah. It was Bonnie Bennett, with all her morality, loyalty and disregard for monstrosity that reminded Elijah of better days.

Bonnie Bennett fought, it was in her nature to do so. Even when she had lost everything, just as she stood before him now, she would fight. She would die if it meant that the entire town, the entirety of the people that she loved, were alive and well. Elena with her carried unimaginable compassion, even to those undeserving of it. Bonnie, in all her tumultuous glory carried with her the strength to learn from life and move on. To fight through every day as if it did not kill her, as if she were not dying a little every day from having lost so much.

Bonnie Bennett was a fresh vanilla breeze in a life so ruined by curses, so scarred with love found and lost, with agony as ancient as any story. Elijah stood silently in her presence, drinking in the calm sight before him and the nervous breeze that was pure vanilla now.

"I wish this would all go away," Bonnie spoke, finally.

Her voice was so quiet that it nearly pulled something from within Elijah.

"One thing I have learned on my time on this Earth, is to be careful for what you wish for," Elijah spoke confidently, yet in a voice no more than a whisper.

Bonnie turned around then, at the quiet of his voice, the stillness of his presence. She met his gaze head on, no anger, no frustration, nothing.

"I wish," she paused slightly before continuing, "this would all go away."

Elijah closed his eyes, and his lips lifted slightly to the side.

"You are so incredibly moral Miss Bennett, and you will do everything in your power to kill us won't you?" Elijah asked in genuine curiosity.

"Do you carry any doubt?" Bonnie retorted.

Elijah shook his head softly, bending it down so she could not see the small, sad smile that had found its way to his lips.

"No," he said simply.

"In another life Miss Bennett, had I met you when I was still human. I think you would have liked me," Elijah stated, not a hint of teasing in his voice.

Bonnie said nothing as she continued to look at the man before her. Elijah was nothing like the rest of his family. When he walked into a room, he exuded _power_. He was so incredibly _old. _His soul seemed to stretch into eternities, his words lilted in ways Bonnie could not imagine. Elijah had seen the world from its new beginnings to the place it was now. She wondered then, if he had any hope for them, if he had any hope left in the humanity he so sorely missed.

"I am leaving Miss Bennett. You will bear no trouble of mine again. I promise you," Elijah spoke gravely.

"I am betting on you Miss Bennett. Not the Salvatores, nor Elena, but you. If anyone can undo the evil my mother has created, it would be you," Elijah halted and stared at Bonnie so intensely she swore the felt the air around her still, "You will not have lost everything in vain."

"Where will you go? Your mother and Finn have already ran. Klaus could find you if he desire-" Bonnie was interrupted by Elijah before she could continue her protest.

"I will not hide, I am no coward. I am merely going to enjoy what beauty the world has left to offer me. Before I die, and this time for good, I want to experience what I loved most when I was human," Elijah said all seriousness.

Bonnie's heart stopped and she tried to focus at the words Elijah was throwing at her.

"You really think I can do this? You really think I will be able to help defeat Klaus?" Bonnie asked in disbelief.

"Miss Bennett, I have met every witch that has descended from your line, all the witches who are fuelling your power from the other side. You do not realize, you cannot fathom, the extent of the power you could hold in a mere flick of the wrist," Elijah explained.

"You need to concentrate now. You will fight only when you are fully capable of doing so. You learn to make your own spells and you master them. Emily and Ayana will help you best with that," Elijah instructed.

"If I kill Klaus you die as well, and Elena…" Bonnie trailed off looking down at the ground.

She looked back at up and saw Elijah with a quizzical look on his beautiful face and continued, "She says you do not deserve to die. Yet you have indirectly killed my mother and if you hadn't backstabbed us during that ritual, Klaus would be dead."

Elijah closed his eyes, remembering everything he had done, and then Bonnie's voice forced him to open his eyes, "But you did it all for family. Everything you have done has been for them, like everything I have done has been for this town and the people I love."

"You and I, Miss Bennett, have done things questionable to those around us, but unmistakably right to our own perception," Elijah shared.

Bonnie and Elijah stood in silence for a moment. It was a sight to make nature cry. A moral Original whose anguish stung ancient, and a righteous powerful Bennett witch. One a perversion of nature, the other its shackled servant. Yet even with their vast differences, Original and Bennett, perversion and servant; they were so inherently the same. They spoke no words, and yet everything fell into place between them. Elijah understood that he would die, and Bonnie understood that she would be forced to kill him. A restoration of nature's balance, and both on either end of its equation.

Elijah walked then, slowly and silently, to where Bonnie stood. She had no energy to keep up the bravado. Bonnie was so tired that her bones felt brittle and her soul ached. He was close enough now that if he so wanted he could snap her neck.

Yet he stood firm, staring at Bonnie's storm filled eyes and whispered, "If I maybe so bold as to ask for a dying wish?"

Bonnie said nothing, but the storm in her eyes calmed, and Elijah took it as cue to whisper, "If you would allow me to come back here before I die, I do not want to sleep forever not having come back to Mystic Falls."

_Without seeing a glimpse of you again. _

Of course he would not allow himself to say his last thought aloud, it would destroy any semblance of sanity between them. Elijah would not die without seeing Bonnie Bennett again, because it meant dying without the hope he had left in this town.

Bonnie closed her eyes, and sighed, nodding her head imperceptibly. Elijah leaned in close, and the overpowering scent of her caramel skin engulfed him. They were not touching, not even the mistake of clothing barely brushing the other's. He moved so that his lips, without even touching her, sent shivers through Bonnie.

He leaned in close to her ear and whispered, "Then I will see you again Bonnie Bennett."

A confident truth and promise.

When Bonnie opened her eyes, Elijah was gone, not a trace of his existence left, and the cold air sliced through Bonnie again.


End file.
